Retcon
by ultharkitty
Summary: Movieverse AU. After the battle in Egypt, the Decepticons regroup, and attempt to rewrite their own pasts in order to make a stronger future. Bonus implied Megatron/Starscream.


"Now that the Fallen has perished," Starscream began, but came to a squeaking halt as a cluster of talons encircled his right optic.

"The what, now?" Megatron said quietly. Smooth as polished steel, his voice was the promise of pain.

Even wounded, Megatron stood tall, not leaning on the ice-covered walls of the Nemesis, let alone submitting to the siren call of stasis lock. Half his face was missing, and his spark glinted fierce and raw through a hole in his chest. The damage sustained in Egypt had been compounded by their speedy exit from Earth's atmosphere. But even here, with only Starscream to see, he made no concession to his wounds.

"Hmmm?" he prompted.

Starscream tried not to squirm. "The uh... well... I have no idea."

"Good."

The talons wandered listlessly, following the grooves and curves of Starscream's faceplates, the sweeping ridges of his helm. Starscream shuddered, and dug his claws into the icy wall at his back.

"We... should see to the repairs," Starscream suggested. Not _your_ repairs, or even _our_ repairs; just 'the repairs', as though they were nothing to do with Megatron at all. Certainly, there could be no suggestion that he required fixing.

Megatron nodded, but made no move to leave. "Alert Soundwave," he said. "I want full surveillance on Prime and the others. All survivors to regroup here."

"Do we have the resources?" Starscream asked, and regretted it instantly. A slight change in pressure, and the almost gentle caresses became vicious.

"Never question me," Megatron snarled. "You've got a lot of ground to make up."

* * *

.

* * *

Soundwave took the news well. The Fallen was a shared hallucination, brought on by energon depletion and the loss of the All Spark, and was never to be spoken of again.

Megatron was, and always had been, their supreme leader. Master of all, servant to none.

* * *

.

* * *

The Nemesis glowed, lit by a blue-tinged phosphorescence from the hatchling pods. In the dim light, Starscream stripped metal from metal, and ground away the names etched into the curved supports of the central command bay. He worked with a fury, quick and precise, and more than a little frustrated.

Megatron had left, flown off to shoot asteroids while the last vestige of the Fallen was erased from his ship.

Starscream's vocaliser vibrated, an unheard growl in the airless room. Now that the Fallen was gone, it was easy to see him for what he really had been. Weakling god, false and dishonourable; dying by inches in the embrace of his altar for fear of the line of Primes, while lesser mechs fought and strove and won without him.

Lesser, ha! It was a joke. But now, the Fallen was being written out: his glyphs erased from the ship as they soon would be from Starscream's own markings. The hatchlings he had helped produce had been stripped down for spare parts and what feeble dregs of energon could be squeezed from their lifeless tanks.

It was a sloughing away of damaged material, and it felt so _right_.

* * *

.

* * *

Megatron returned as the last weak rays of the sun were eclipsed by the planet's bulk. A quick glance around the command centre was followed by a low growl. "Get over here."

Starscream writhed as Megatron scraped at layer after layer of chromatic nanites, digging a thousand shallow gouges in the metal underneath.

Face to the floor, Starscream whimpered, as the abrasive claws wandered off course, trailing along sensitive cables and sliding beneath armour plates.

Starscream could have changed the markings himself, quickly and painlessly - as easy as switching between root and alt modes - but Megatron had insisted, and who was he to be denied?

* * *

.

* * *

The hatchlings squirmed and chirruped in their cocoons, swimming in an energy-rich soup synthesised from the natural resources of Saturn's moons. But it wasn't enough. Periodically, Starscream weeded out the failures and allowed their stronger brethren to cannibalise their remains.

It should never have been like this. If it wasn't for the Autobots, their stubborn pride and perverted ideals, the source of life would never have been lost, and the new army would not be starving, denied even their first taste of victory.

* * *

.

* * *

The survivors arrived at irregular intervals over the next few solar cycles. They came to rest just inside the shattered hull, broken and drained. Some carried their own severed limbs, others were missing vital parts. There was an air of defeat about them that grated on Starscream's sensors and made him want to slag the lot of them and start again.

They grovelled before Megatron, frost-limned on the cold metal floor. Their armour scraped raw, they crawled and pleaded, and eventually - conditionally - they were forgiven.

"We will prevail," Megatron reminded them. "We are alive. We will collect our strength, we will prepare, and we will strike. You are my army. Ready yourselves."

_And this time_, Starscream thought, _we won't have that chain around our necks, dragging us down. This time, there is only us_.

* * *

.

* * *

Soundwave alone had emerged unscathed from the events-that-must-not-be-named. He didn't retreat to the Nemesis, but remained in orbit, quietly gathering intelligence and feeding it back to the base in regular, detailed reports.

With time, the data crystallised into patterns, and the patterns were checked against new data. It became a time of watching and waiting, and for once Starscream could banish the grating little doubts that they were overstretching themselves, that they couldn't harvest appropriate fuel quickly enough. No, this time, they would _really_ be ready. It would be how it should have been all along.

And as Soundwave processed more and more data, one thing became abundantly clear: the Autobots had no idea where the Decepticons were or how many of them had survived.

* * *

.

* * *

Starscream stood on a high plateau, wings furling and unfurling in a restless dance. His claws ached for the press of hot metal, the flow of spilled energon. Megatron paced in front of him, a bright gleam against the glowering bulk of Saturn.

Below them, on the valley floor, their forces assembled.

Row after row of mechs, all of them flight-capable, all of them loyal. The ancient and the new stood side by side, a glorious army united under Megatron. No distractions, this time, no vengeance born of pathetic long-forgotten squabbles. Just the fight for survival, and all that came with it.


End file.
